Responding to the Strain of Parental Incarceration: The Moderating Role of Prosocial Bonds

• In Event: Poster Session

Abstract

The existence of a strong, positive relationship between parental incarceration and juvenile offending is well documented across the extant literature. However, considerably less research focuses on understanding the factors that moderate this relationship, specifically protective factors, being those variables that reduce the strength of the correlation. The present study will assess the extent to which prosocial bonds may alleviate the negative emotionality associated with delinquency under Agnew’s general strain theory in an attempt to identify meaningful areas and points for intervention in the lives of adolescents with incarcerated parents. However, given the state of mixed evidence on how the relationship between parental incarceration and delinquency functions across race and ethnicity, particular attention will be paid to these variables in the analysis. Analysis will occur at the individual level, specifically focusing on juveniles with incarcerated parents captured by the Fragile Families and Child Well-Being data.

Author

• Michael Lebron, University of Maryland, College Park